2009 building logs

January 2009 Cabin sides on boat.

Very exciting times. I am finally at a stage of the build that I can see the end and to me it is nearer than the start. Many builders tell you that the shell is the easy part and takes about a third of the time. I cant see it myself. It has taken me 3 years to get the shell built, and I think I can finish from here in 2 years at most, 1 year at best so somewhere in between is about right. I can finally tell people when they ask (always the first questions when first learning of the project) that I launch next year! Next year is a time most people can deal with. When I first started not even I could deal with 5 years, who knows what they will be doing in 5 years? But next year, easy. Most phone contracts last longer than that and we sign them without a second thought. This years NY resolution is to try harder to get 80 hours a month done. I have 2000 hours so far, I want to be at 3000 hours next NY day. From 3000 hours the end will only be a few short months away, (I think I can get away with 3500 hours including fairing and painting) and with any luck I can afford to pay for some help on the last few hundred hours so they may even be achieved this year. This month I plan to get the roof glued and glassed onto BH6 and then get the huge wrap around panels kerfed and onto the boat. That will leave just the rear steps and duckboard to complete the shell.

January 1 Lining up the roof for gluing on

Last January I did not get much work done (in fact I only did 34 hours for the month) because of the heat. Well, it hit 36 degrees today, but I am determined to get more done so I managed 3 hours of light duties. I repositioned the top on the boat in exactly the correct position and I was pleasantly surprised with how well it lines up. I measured the gaps for the cabin wrap around and I am at tolerances of below 5mm all around. There is no twist and the measurements are the same all around, I think it is the best tolerances I have had so far. I must be getting the hang of this boat building! I don't even need to use screws to pull the roof down onto the bulkhead because it fits so well. I just need to lift it off the bulkhead to smear glue on the top edge to glue it down now. I just have to be careful when I put it back down that I meet up with all of the marks I have made to line it up again.

I do think the roof is still leaning down slightly as it goes forward but this will be corrected by the cabin sides as it is sitting flush to the bulkhead top. The bulkhead is still a tiny bit flexible and the top will still be able to be lifted or dropped at the front to meet the cabin sides once they go on so I am extremely happy with the fit of this massive single part. About the only slight issue I have is there appears to be a slight downturn of the roof line once it passes over the bulkhead, in other words the bulkhead marks the high point of the roof and it rises to it from the front then the cockpit overhang drops about 10mm over 2 metres once past it. I am not concerned by it as it means that water will run off the roof fast and it is hard to notice except with a straight edge. I also think the rear edge of the roof is at the exact height it should be. I want it neither higher nor lower, not that 10mm would make that much difference but the reason I believe it to be at the exact correct height is that any lower and I will start to hit my head as I step down under it into the cockpit (at this height I clear it as I step in without being conscious to miss it) and any higher and I wont be comfortable leaning on top of it with my elbows and hands under my chin when standing along the back seats to look over the cabin

So with that little job making me feel warm and fuzzy, well actually up on the boat I was feeling hot and bothered, I moved down to the relative coolness of ground level to mark the kerf lines into the massive cabin side wrap around panels. The method is to equally divide the shorter inside of the curve and the longer outside of the curve to mark the lines in a way that will mean the panel curves equally at top and bottom. The 2 panels port and starboard are identical mirror images and then there is a 2 meter square (2070mm x 2200mm) panel that joins them in the middle into one long wrap around.

I am probably going to need help to get these panels up onto the boat once I have kerfed them, they are difficult enough to man handle before I kerf them but after kerfing they will be fragile until glued onto the boat. The irony of these big panels is that the majority of them will later be cut out of them for the massive wrap around windows these boats have, leaving only the top and bottom 200mm and 4 mullions about 200mm each, but for now the panels need to stay full size in order to insure fairness.

That brief work done I headed home for another family get together, the pleasure of my company was requested home early in order to bring sauce for the bbq that we had run out of. It was unlikely I would have worked much longer, I need to procrastinate overnight before committing to gluing the roof down or cutting the kerfs! Old habits die hard. All in all a very satisfying start to 2009.

January 2 Roof glued on

The roof is glued onto the boat. But I did have a strange occurrence and a minor hiccup or 2. I lifted the roof off the bulkhead and slid blocks in to hold it off the bulkhead in order to smear glue along the top of the bulkhead which is the uni rope. I had sanded it to pre score it and had marks on the roof and on the bulkhead to line it up. I mentioned yesterday I have to be careful to get the top back down off the blocks. I had mentioned yesterday that I had the roof in the exact position within 5mm tolerances of the gap needed for the wrap around panels all around.

When I lifted the roof off the bulkhead I realised that the marks on the bulkhead were on the peel ply, which I had to remove before I glued the top on. So I carefully removed the peelply and transposed the marks to the panel exactly below where the mark was on the peel ply. Then I smeared glue over the bulkhead edge, removed the blocks and lowered the roof back down to the marks on the bulkhead to line up with the marks on the roof.

I could not get the 2 centre lines (one each side of the bulkhead) to line up again with one being a couple of mm out. Not a problem but annoying as I am absolutely sure that I transposed the marks from the peel ply to exactly the right spot on the bulkhead by tearing the peel ply off just past the mark then using the peelply as tracing paper to ensure the line below on the bulkhead surface still lined up exactly which it did, so I cant explain why the marks did not line up exactly now. Nevermind, I worked on, removing the excess glue that squeezed out and making small coves with the excess glue. I knew I would not have time to cove and tape today so a light sand tomorrow to remove glue dags and I will cove and tape tomorrow.

I placed screws a few mm into the underside of the roof each side of the bulkhead in order to hold the roof along the marked lines each side to set exactly in position. I did not need to screw the roof down as the join is so good but I did clamp it at the edges just to be sure it does not move while setting.

Then when I had it clamped, screws holding it to the marks, and the glue filling the join and the excess removed and neat coves made along each side ready for taping, I re-measured and the port side measurements exactly matched yesterdays which is the gap about 5mm smaller than the wrap around panel size meaning I will need a slight trim but the starboard side the gap was now even smaller! Smaller is not a problem, it just means I will need to trim more roof or side panel away to make it fit the panel (it would have been a problem if the gap became bigger than the panel). The gap on the starboard side went from being about 5mm too small yesterday to about 25mm too small today. The only explanation is that I made a mistake in my measurement yesterday. If the gap on the port side grew by the same amount that the starboard size shrank I could understand exactly what had happened but it stayed constant so I cant explain how 2 otherwise equal measurements are not now equal.

Anyway, no real problems. The top is glued on and tomorrow will be glassed on.

January 3 Roof glassed on

Its amazing how long things take when you either stop to admire your work so far or you measure everything a 100 times. I am guilty of both and probably wasted an hour doing both today. Never mind. I did get the roof glassed onto the bulkhead, which included the usual coving as well. It was not a particularly hot day, that's coming tomorrow according to the forecast so work was quite comfortable. Once I had both sides of the bulkhead taped to the roof I started to work on the cabin front panel, well when I say work, I mean getting it in place, I mean dry fit and then more measuring of various openings and panel sizes to be sure everything all still fits.

Once the cabin front panel had its centreline marked I could line that up with the centreline that is permanently marked to the boat. Then once in place it shows the space each side that the curved wrap around will fill. There is still going to be some movement of the roof up and down (even twist if needed) as the bulkhead has some give in it but ideally you want the roof in the correct place without needing to coerce it much and you want BH6 to stay square and plumb but a little movement required at the front of the roof is only a tiny movement at the bulkhead. The front panel is resting dry in the slot where it will be glued at the bottom but held by the top by about 5mm (less in places) which by just lifting the top a couple of mm opens the space enough for the front to fit into the space.

Once the roof glass is set I can manipulate the roof if needed. Next step will be to kerf the wrap arounds and get them onto the boat (another job that will require some help) so I have an easy day planned for tomorrow, fit the timber braces that will stop the kerfed panel in the correct position and cut the kerfs.

I had a lucky escape today. I was cleaning the glue dags in the join between the roof and bulkhead and scoring it so that I could glass over it, with an angle grinder with sanding disk with it locked in the on position via its locking switch when I dropped it. As it fell to the floor it brushed my leg on the way down just nicking my pants and leg. It barely drew blood but could have been a lot worse. I jumped out of the way as it fell which obviously helped. And double fortunately it did not fall on its side or blade so it did no damage to the boat.

January 4 Wrap arounds ready to go on

I slept in today and missed the chance to work in the relative coolness of the morning. I got to the shed at 11am and it was already stinking hot so by 3.00pm I had gone home for a swim. I did manage to get the kerfs cut on the wrap around panels and potter around measuring things and generally wasting time because the heat up on the boat was such that I did not get the timber braces that will create a rest for the kerfed panel onto the boat.

 

Cutting the kerfs was also quite a time consuming job. I set them 50mm apart along the inside of the curve. I re read the construction manual and it says there is no set distance apart but recommends about 80-90mm apart. I assume that to also mean at the inside of the curve but it does not say. At 50mm apart along the inside of the curve means 115mm apart along the outside of the curve. So I went with this and marked all of the lines at that distance. But once I had cut the kerfs in the first half of the first wrap around and did a quick test to see if the kerfs would allow the panel to curve enough, I realised that I did not need that many kerfs and I started cutting every second line and as luck would have it, I started at the tighter end of the curve on the first one so it worked out that whilst I might need the extra cuts on the tight end of the curve I would not need them as the curve levelled out. So I cut the other side the same way, leaving every second line for the last 5 lines. That's 10 less lines I had to cut and 10 less I will need to fill with glue later.

I was tempted to pick one of the panels up and try out the complete panel to see the shape but it is just too fragile. I will have to wait until it is on the boat. One thing finally occurred to me today after cutting many kerfs. I often get splinters but not always. And today I started at the top of one panel worked to the other end (we will call it the bottom) then from the bottom of the next back around to the top as per the pic above. And at the bottom few kerfs on both panels I got splinters but not on the cuts before or after, so it could not be the blade or the saw. I realised today that it is the grain of the glass. I had thought it might be the blades getting blunt or the battery failing thus lowering the rpm on the battery saw but today I used the electric knowing the battery one would not last for the entire job. I do recommend leaving the peel ply on when cutting kerfs in duflex, it does mean you have to remove a lot of thin strips of peel ply but it does reduce splintering.

I am very close to being able to fit the wrap around and it is only the first week of January so I am pretty sure I will get this thing done this month.

January 5 Too hot to work

I did not even go to the shed today knowing in advance how hot it would be inside it. I had the time but even though I want to get more done this year, it is just too hot to be effective.

One thing I forgot to mention yesterday that is worth adding (a forum entry reminded me) is the value of covering up even in the heat to perform certain tasks. Kerfing duflex with a circular saw is one task you want to wear a breathing mask, goggles and most importantly long sleeve shirt and gloves. The reason is that the circular saw spits out tiny shards of very sharp glass, hundreds of thousands of them, that hit your skin like tiny poison darts. You cant see them or even feel them initially but they will end up creating an itchy rash on your inner forearms. Even short cuts have resulted in rashes on my arms. Yesterday I cut what amounted to about 70 meters of cutting (60 cuts of about 1.2 meters each) and at the end of it I did not have a rash not even a pimple on my inner forearms. It is uncomfortable on hotter days but only for the time it takes to make the cuts. As soon as I was done I took the long sleeve shirt off again. But it works. It is worth the temporary short discomfort to avoid a longer discomfort later.

It does not look like cooling down tomorrow, the forecast is more of the same, cloudless sky (this is the main problem, sun beating down on steel roof superheats the shed) and about 38 degrees (over 100 Fahrenheit in the old scale) outside so about 10% hotter in the shed. I need a cooler day (or get up really early) to glue the kerfs on the wrap arounds as I need the open time on the glue to get all of the kerfs filled with glue without it starting to go off before I am done.

January 8 Still too hot to work

The mini heat wave continues. 4 days of 30 plus heat, today reached close to 40 degrees.  I have not been to the shed for a couple of days, I went in today and did not get much done on the boat, it is just too hot at any elevation above the floor, so I pottered around staring at various parts of the boat thinking of how I will do this or how I will do that. I did scour the shed for timber beams to use as supports for the roof. As the build phase nears completion, offcuts, timber bits etc are getting scarce. I also started gathering my offcuts and spare duflex to make my rear steps, but they are the next project after the cabin sides are on.

January 10 Wraps around the boat.

I finally got some work done on the boat today. I started preparations for fitting the wrap around panels to the boat. This would seem a relatively easy task and it normally would be, but I have not yet glued and glassed the side decks to the boat. I still have some work to do on the aft section of them to change them to my cabin design (they were kit cut to be walk through transoms). This means that I don't have a stable platform to work on. I solved this by putting the cedar planks I have (I believe they would be used in the mast steps were I going with the traditional rig) that I have been using as scaffold, along the side deck spanning the bulkheads. Even if the side decks were glued in, not being attached to anything across the bulkhead span would mean they would snap the moment I put my weight on them, but once attached to the wrap around the girder effect takes over and they become solid platforms that you could jump on and they would not break.

I found some timber pieces and started to attach them around the cabin side opening to form a supporting beams for the wrap around to sit in (so as not to fall through the gap and break at a kerf) once the kerfed panel was put in place around the cabin. I discovered a problem once I started attaching the supports. The angle on the sides of bulkhead 5 match the cabin side angles of bulkhead 6, and I have slightly raised bulkhead 5 so these matching angles are more obvious, however the moment I put the braces on I could see that the wrap around, if it were to go where the roof edge and flat deck curve dictated it would go, would mean that the angle of the cabin side would change as it came forward from BH6. If this is ok then the angle on BH5 needed to be changed and a little bit trimmed from it, no big deal, 2 minutes work. But I am not sure yet if this is going to be ok. So I wont cut it until I am fitting the cabin sides and there is no other option. I am not sure if the cabin side can have a twist in it, even a small one. This potential problem halted me in my tracks for about an hour while I tried to figure out if it was going to be a major issue or not. I checked the other side to see if it had the same problem, because if it didn't it meant the roof was twisted and attached out of square.

To my relief it has the same angle change (the exact same angle on each side, I checked it with an angle square. So it cant be that the roof is on wrong. If it is a major problem it has to be that the roof is made too small (it would need to be wider at the roof to make the angle needed to match BH6 or the front deck with the curved cut out for the cabin side base is not right. This can be cut easily but I could not see how this could be out. Anyway, I searched for a reason or a solution and decided I could not find one until I put the wrap around panel on.

Over the years some of the things that building has taught me is that the kit can be out a little but more importantly there is practically nothing that cant be (fairly easily) fixed. So I left that issue to be resolved later and moved on.

Next step was to brace the kerfed panel so that I could lift it onto the boat. Once a panel like this is kerfed it becomes fragile and unstable and extremely difficult to move without damage. The only option is to return the panel to a stiff state. I did this by sliding pine 4x2 planks under the panel then using 19mm mdf strips, screwing through the panel to connect it all so as to stop the panel flexing in either direction.

I then carried it over to the side of the boat (after moving the daggers) and carefully lifted it onto 44gallon drums I had placed there. From there I was able to slide it up the hull side and onto the deck. But unfortunately I was not the able to manoeuvre it the rest of the way into place. It was just too long and now that it had the bracing on, too heavy to get it into place from one end or the other on my own. I needed help to move it the last few inches into place. I couldn't risk the panel falling down the curved deck sides and down onto the floor possibly destroying it, and I simply didn't have the strength or purchase to move it from one end or the other into place.

Fortunately for me, Jo's son Jake (who has helped a number of times over the years as he has grown so has the boat) helped me lift it these last few inches into place. With the panel in place all that remained was to remove the bracing to see how it fit. I already knew I would need to trim the roof about 20mm based on the measuring I had done. This new issue with the bulkhead angle (and as a result roof angle) also needed to be looked at but all of this will have to wait another day.

Tomorrow I will trim the various points where the roof is too big (the gap is too small) for the wrap around and dry fit it. That should dramatically change the look of the boat.

January 10 Its starting to look like a boat mate.

Only a builder (possibly only a cat builder) would know what this sentence means. As grating as it becomes you even find yourself saying it. But its true. At various stages what you are doing doesn't resemble what you are going to end up with. Hulls upside down, hulls not joined, joined hulls but no cabin, etc. Well today (from the Starboard side of the boat at least), I can finally say that my boat looks like most other Schionning cats, albeit not shinny white with black windows!

I started the day with the panel in place but with the braces stopping the panel from bending at the kerfs into place. I had also forgotten to remove the peel ply on the inside. So with great difficulty due to the size of the screws I removed them which released the planks either side of the panel. I also removed the peel ply strips from between the kerfs. (I always cut the kerfs with the peel ply on as it reduces glass splintering). One they were removed I got the panel to curve into place as close as I could, given that the panel is still about 20mm larger than the gap along the sides (no idea yet of what if any trimming will be needed after the curve starts).

I marked the overlap, moved the panel back away from the roof using blocks to keep it apart, and I cut the 20mm off the roof side. I then replaced the curved panel and again found points some only a mm, where the panel was still binding, and I removed them with the grinder. The panel would still not drop down into the slot and I started to worry that perhaps I had a bigger problem than I thought. I could torture the panel down around the roof but not easily.

It was then I remembered that BH5 needed to be trimmed. I moved the panel back again, cut the bulkhead to the angle line I had marked. Fortunately on this bulkhead the uni rope is buried in the bulkhead (so that its curve is minimised) so the top is free to be trimmed.

Once trimmed the kerfed panel fit into the gap meeting the cabin top almost perfectly but not quite meeting the curve of the flat deck panel. The gap in the middle is about 20mm. This gap does not concern me, I have filled bigger. It is too big to be filled with just glue mix so I will use offcuts to fill most of it before coving and glassing the join.

There is still a little binding here and there and mostly by just a mm or 2, some are just the tabs that I have not cut away flush with the edge of the panel (the little bit of balsa that held the panels in the sheets). Once these are trimmed and tab blocks are used to close up and fair any unevenness in the joins I will be ready to dry fit the other side before gluing and glassing these curved panels.

But once this panel went on I could not help but stand back and admire the now near complete shape my boat is taking on. The flat middle joining panel is just sitting in place as a guide to where the curved kerf panels must finish, but with them both on, the shape from the starboard side is nearly complete.

It was again extremely hot over the weekend so though the hours were put in, the progress was slow. I had a headache not unlike that I get from heat stroke when I am in the sun all day. I kept my fluids up but heat exhaustion is likely to have been the cause. And 2 hours were lost over the weekend to problem solving (1 hour on Saturday) and lollygagging admiration (1 hour on Sunday). But who could blame me? I still enjoy looking at the last 3 pictures and admiring what I have accomplished to this point. On days like today, I can truly see the end and feel that she will be in the water soon.

January 18 Entire cabin on boat.

The Sydney heat wave continued this week. I know I mention this a lot but unfortunately I mention it to explain why no work is getting done. But mercifully a cool southerly change swept through on Friday evening so the weekend was a more mild mid 20's. I needed it. I had the starboard wrap around in place and mostly pulled and pushed (pulled down with screws and blocks, pushed up with braces underneath) so that the shape was correct with no highs or lows that would need bog to fair out.

Getting the panel exactly right is very frustrating and slow progress. The reason it is so frustrating is it is a bit like poking a balloon filled with water. The kerfed panel is a lot like it. If you pull or push on the panel here, it changes shape in there. So you either abandon that move or if you have to keep it you go to fix the new change and that fix job creates yet another movement. And something I have mentioned before, 2 men doing 1 hour can get much more done that 1 guy doing 2. Each adjustment required me to go outside the boat (or inside depending on where I was making the adjustment) and check the panel from aft looking up the side and from forward looking down the side to be sure that I did not have a bulge or valley that would create fairing issues later. With a second worker, the moving is eliminated saving so much time and so much climbing in and out, up and down. My muscles are sore from the work out. And I am going to have to put stairs in the hulls very soon, I am getting tired of climbing into and out of the hulls without them. I get what I call old man bones and shuffle around the house in the evenings feeling like an old man.

So in all it took me about 2 full days to get the first wrap around in place and exactly in place. As the shed started to heat up in mid afternoon I decided that it was too warm to glue the kerfs and that I would get a start on the port side. I found the same problems as on the first side, the roof needed to be trimmed but not as much as the other side. However, sometimes, for me at least, as small trim is harder to achieve than a large trim. I needed to trim 25mm off the side of the cabin roof on the starboard side, but only 5mm on the port side. (it is still a mystery to me how these gaps are so different, given that the roof centreline meets the hull centreline so theoretically the gaps should have been the same but no worries I just deal with it.) It is quite difficult for me to cut just 5mm off with a jigsaw and ironically I got a near perfect fit when trimming 25mm but ended up with a 5mm gap when trimming just 5mm off, so in effect I trimmed 10mm off!

I still found the roof binding here and there. The middle pic shows that I could not get the wrap around to meet the roof as it wrapped around leaving a 25mm gap that I needed to close up. Then I found the point that was causing the panel to push down as it bent around and marked it out. Once this 200mm sections was trimmed about 12mm the gap was gone and the wrap met the roof as it should. Also on the starboard side I noticed that I may have trimmed the bulkhead too much by about 20mm so I under trimmed on the port side (first pic above you can see the mark where I should have trimmed to but didn't) and it took me about half an hour to realise that it was this that was stopping the wrap from being pulled down all  the way. I found just as I was knocking off which was a relief. I hate going home with problems I cant solve.

This morning I did the traditional Sunday morning early start and was up at 6am and got the the shed about 7am. I started first on gluing the kerfs as it was very cool in the shed. I got a halogen light set up in the cabin (it soon warmed up in there!) and got to filling the kerfs with glue, but pushing out on the kerfed panel to open the kerf us then using a wide plastic spatula and a flexible steel spatula to push glue into the kerfs. Doing it this way means the glue mix has to be exactly right, too thick and the glue wont go all the way into the kerf but too runny and gravity will cause application to be a nightmare and very messy and cause it to run out of the kerf. I quickly found the right consistency and got to filling the kerf from the rear forward as I went around. I took a lot more care for the top and bottom 400mm of the kerfs and whilst I filled the middle of the kerfs I was not as careful on this section, as it will be cut out for the windows. It took me about 2 hours to get the kerfs filled and the panel back in place exactly as it was to set.

By this time it was 9.30am so I headed home to bring Jo a fresh coffee for breakfast and to let the sides set a while without me moving about on the boat. When I got back to the shed about 10.30am the glue was starting to harden and I was confident it would not move if I started moving about on the boat. I got to work setting the port wrap around in perfectly in place. I started by removing the peel ply from the inside of the panel between the kerfs (yes I forgot again to remove it before lifting the panel up onto the boat. The I cut the rest of BH5 overhang that I under trimmed. Then I started on the balloon pushing! I may not have mentioned it before but like other flat panels that turn into curved panels, they need a bit of cajoling into place and sometime the pressure needed seems too much but using long strong screws and blocks it eventually groans and creaks down into place. After being held in place for a while it gets a bit of memory for the shape and if you release it and then pull it back down again, it pulls back down much easier.

As with all things I have done on the build, the second time around happens a lot faster. I have a bit better fit on the first one but close enough that gluing the sides on wont be a problem. I will need to use some offcuts on the middle of the curve each side but once the kerfed panels are stiff with glue and glass then gluing and taping them in will be fairly easy. So in other words the hard work on the cabin roof is now done. It took 2 full days to do the first but I was able to get the second side exactly in place in just 1 day. Unfortunately it was mid afternoon (3.30pm) but the time I was ready to put the glue in the kerfs and decided it was getting too warm, and I was pretty tired and sore so I will glue the kerfs tomorrow.

Once both sides are glued I can take the panels off the boat again which will be fairly easy because the panels will be stiff, and sand them and glass them. I probably wont fully glass them as the middles will be cut out for the windows. I will run 400mm tapes top and bottom and where the mullions (braces that run between the windows to help keep the roof up and re-strengthen the structure as the windows weaken it) will be, this will save glass, resin and work. But one thing I did learn is that the cut outs need to be intact (so I may need to glass them later with light cloth) as they are used as molds to hot form the Perspex windows if using hot forming (cold forming is done on the boat by torturing the panel around).

The middle panel is sitting in place, with only a small gap at the top of the port side to fill. I trimmed the starboard side when I should have just turned the panel over but again the gap is only 10mm so it will be easy to fill. I intend to glue and glass the cabin sides on but I wont be gluing the middle front panel on until later so that I can get to the water tanks as I am not ready to run the plumbing just yet.

All in all a good weekends work. The cabin is now on the boat!

January 22 Cabin sides kerfs glued.

Today I finally glued the port side cabin side kerfs. The mid week heat waves we have had nearly every week this year (well last week and this week) have kept me off the build most days, (funnily enough it has been cooler on the weekends) and yesterday after 35 degrees all day there was a cool change in the afternoon which included a tropical electrical storm and a lot of rain but not a change in temperature. The prevailing storm direction here is southerly which brings with it cooler air but this storm was a westerly and while the wind whipped up it was warm. I was twilight sailing on a friend boat yesterday evenening and we had a little too much sail up so we pulled the genoa down and turned around and went with the wind back to the dock. I got soaked but really enjoyed the excitement. The race started with little or no wind (the calm before the storm) but ended with most pulling out. After all it is social racing.

This morning the sun came out again which lead to another hot day, a bit cooler than the last few days that have all been mid 30's, today was 30 but of course with the sun out heating the tin roof on the shed, it was 40 inside. Nevertheless I was determined to get the other cabin side glued so that I can take both sides back off the boat on the weekend, sand and glass them and put them back on again, perhaps permanently but gluing them on.

I set up a fan inside the cabin as well as the lights and spent 2 hours filling the kerfs with glue. Because it was much hotter this time (I did the starboard side at 7am last Sunday) the glue was much thinner so I needed to thicken it with more powder than I used last time, but to the same consistency I had last time, and used the same amount of glue and it took the same amount of time.

It was hard work, even with the fan on it was damn hot and my shirt was soaking wet with sweat at the end of it. But I am relieved to have it done, it can set tomorrow (it was probably set half an hour after I went home) and I can finish the cabin on the weekend if it is not too hot.

January 25 Cabin sides kerfs glassed.

The Sydney heat wave continues, 4 straight days over 30 and yesterday it hit 41 degrees in Sydney meaning I lost a Saturday on the boat. I went into the shed a couple of times over the past few days and each day decided it was simply too hot to work. It makes no sense to knock myself around to get this boat finished. I knew the forecast would mean I would not be working on the boat on Saturday so when on Friday I was invited to sail down to Sydney and stay on the boat overnight I jumped on it. I got back around mid day on Saturday and Jo and I worked at her shop, putting stock that arrived the day before away. On Thursday we manually unloaded 8 pallets of stock in the middle of a 40 degree day. Fortunately it only took an hour and the shop is air-conditioned, so we got to work the rest of the day sorting the stock in reasonable conditions. If only the shed were air conditioned.

Last night there was the predicted southerly change so the air is cooler, and more importantly the sky clouded over so the shed would remain a decent temperature. Nevertheless I decided an early start would be a good idea. I got started at 7.30am (a normal Sunday start) and knocked off at 1.30pm. I started by taking the wrap around panels off the boat. The starboard side panel came off easily enough, I slid it down the side of the boat and onto 44 gallon drums I had placed along side, then got down and carried them to the back of the boat where I have floor space.

Then when I tried the same on the Port wrap I have the dagger-case already through the side so I had to lift the wrap over it (it is not glued in yet or cut down to flush with the deck) and as I lifted it over this I heard the creak then before I could react it broke down a kerf. (As it later turned out, the kerf that broke was only partially glued because it sat behind a brace in the boat). To say I was annoyed was an understatement and expletives may have been uttered. The panel had not broken, it had just split down a kerf. It is not surprising that this would be possible. he kerfs are just balsa glued to balsa and perhaps some glass is glued to glass but the glue is fragile. It does not have multi directional strength until glass is added.

However, now the problem was how to get it down without breaking it completely. If I could do that, then this was not really a problem at all. It would simply be reglued and glassed. The only minor issue I might have is would I be able to get it exactly the same shape as it had set to on the boat, that is would the curve still be fair? If not then bog would be needed, but the amount I felt I could be out by could not be much, I just had to get the kerf to meet up again. But first I had to get it down, on my own. I got it down in the same way as I did the unbroken panel, I just had to be a little more careful.

Once down I had to move it carefully around to where I could work on it and then with both panels down I set about gluing and glassing them. I knew I would be filling gaps in kerfs that had been behind braces, (the pic on the right above is a kerf glue gap on the starboard panel that I will fill with glue as I glass) and I could not get glue into while on the boat. So filling the broken kerf was not going to be difficult now it was down. And it was down with the outside glass intact and undamaged as far as I can tell. To say I was relieved was and understatement.

I then had an hour or so of sanding. Not pleasant but not too difficult. I had pre-marked the inside of the panels with an idea of where I want the mullions to be (mullions are braces between the windows that strengthen the structure to hold the roof up). I had already decided that to save glass and resin (and work) I would only glass the edges (300mm tapes top and bottom) and where the mullions will go, because the rest will be cut out of the panel and replaced with the Perspex windows. I did learn that I would need to keep the cut-outs to size and shape the Perspex if I decided on hot molded factory pre-shaped windows as they use the cut-outs as templates. I probably wont need to use this method because my windows can be cold molded (flat panels of Perspex cut to shape but not molded to the curve and then gently tortured around the curve) because of the position of the mullions, they wont curve around the hardest part of the curve.

Once the wraps were sanded I glassed them and applied peel ply, because the glass will be glassed to again when the roof is glued and glassed to the side panels and when the mullions (probably 100mm carbon tubes cut in half) are glassed in.

Once this was done I left them to set and took the rest of the day off.

January 26 Starboard cabin side glued on.

Jo and I walked in to Gosford foreshore for the Australia Day celebrations today which took up all morning so I started on the boat at 2pm. The day was cool so I knew I would be able to get a start on gluing the cabin sides onto the boat.

I started by removing the peelply and sanding any bubbles in the peel ply because the section of surface not in contact with peelply is not keyed and also to remove any glass overhanging the edges, besides it is easier to sand the panel flat on the ground then overhead on the boat. Once done it was time to lift one of the panel back onto the boat. It suddenly felt hot in the shed after manhandling the panel back onto the boat.

It took me a while to get the panel back into its exact position. To my surprise the panel is still quite flexible and needed to be coerced back down just as it had to be when I first attached it before gluing. I thought the gluing would mean that it had a shape it would keep and glassing just reinforced that. But as I said, it needed to be pushed or pulled down into place with screws and block.

Once I had the panel in place I glued it onto BH6 then started filling the gaps between the roof and the side. In the middle of this join I felt that it was too big for the filler to sit without sagging so I filled it with a thin duracore offcut which at 20mm wide is quite flexible. I applied glue to each side of it and put it in the gap and filled it over with filler.

I coved the bulkhead join inside and glassed it. The outside of the bulkhead join does not have enough overhang yet to glass to but once I glass the final part of the cabin sides that overhangs around the cockpit to provide a little side protection from water to the cockpit, I will then have enough panel to glass to.

I continued filling the edges top outside and bottom inside (because it is from these sides that the gap is wider) until I had coving material coming out the other side. I was careful to overfill the gaps so that I could round them off when set ready for glassing in the same way I filled the hull panel gaps.

I will still have to fill under the tabs that are pulling the panel down into place but I will attach the port panel first and fill and glue that and fill the gaps while it also sets then I will just have the tabs on the port side left to fill before I can sand it all rounded and then glass the whole thing together. Once glassed the roof and sides will become rigid.

I set out to get the cabin glued and glassed on in January and with a little luck I might just make it.

January 31 Port cabin side glued on.

The January heat has been unrelenting. It was the same last year, in fact it was so bad (and it was my first summer in this shed) that I got a bit disheartened and only managed 34 hours. I had hoped to double that this year and get to 68 hours but the heat beat me and I only got to 65 hours for the month. And because of the heat the work was slow going, but is relative to hot conditions every year. the 8 hours today was akin to 4 hours work in winter.

My goal for January was also to have the cabin top glued and glassed on. I have it mostly glued on, there are just sections along the bottom at the middle of the curves that needs filling with duflex before it is finished. So I can probably sand the glued top join inside and out but the bottom may not get glassed until mid week. So I again I got close and I am happy with the progress given the heat, which I have no control over.

With the roof and sides almost on, January has completely changed the look of the project and it is now almost at its final shape. The next month or 2 will see the final shape emerge.